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This paper seeks to replicate a study done in 1992 on the bibliographic availability of 55 popular culture periodicals sold by a Kroger supermarket in Royal Oak, Michigan. The earlier study asked the question whether time might be a relevant variable for the number of holding libraries.

The authors searched WorldCat for the number of reported library holdings for the same 55 popular culture periodicals and analyzed the results.

During both periods, 34 periodicals with holdings had a median increase of 58.4 percent; but, when the 83.5 percent increase in OCLC governing members during the same period was taken into account, holdings had a median decrease of 13.7 percent. For the 19 cases with no library holdings in 1992, eight (42.1 percent) now had library holdings, including several high circulation periodicals such as Star and Soap Opera Weekly.

Popular culture materials read by many Americans are still not widely available in libraries or are not entered into WorldCat, the prime source for bibliographic holdings.

This paper provides additional statistical evidence on the availability of popular culture materials in libraries.

The union catalogue of monographs published before 1976 is maintained by the Dutch National Library in card form and contains five to six million records from 95 libraries. The extent to which these records need to be converted into machine‐readable form depends on several factors. Does the holding library still exist? Does the holding library participate in the Pica shared cataloguing system and has it converted its own card catalogue? Did the holding library convert its card catalogue using another library system? Are the cards in the union catalogue still reliable or did the holding library discard volumes from its collection without notifying the National Library? A feasibility study showed that the holding data of 59 libraries could be removed without any further processing; this amounts to 72.6 per cent of the cards. For the remaining 27.4 per cent of the cards from 36 libraries, priorities for the retrospective conversion of their data in the union catalogue were determined.

Preparation of bibliographic data for the production of CD‐ROM public access catalogs (PACs) requires several services: merging records from various vendors or libraries, the elimination of duplicate records, the identification and decoding of holdings information, updating the database (often in an offline mode), and authority control. The nature of specific CD‐ROM catalogs affects the priorities for processing the database. For example, some systems exploit controlled vocabulary and cross references, making subject authority critical. Others provide powerful Boolean searching on key words derived from all parts of the bibliographic record; as a result, the need for quality control checks beyond those typically provided by library vendors is increased. This article identifies the services and processes offered by seven vendors that provide CD‐PACs and one vendor that processes MARC bibliographic databases.

The paper seeks to provide an overview of the approach taken by the Danish library community towards the automation of ILL and end‐user loan requests.

The physical union catalogue DanBib is explained, along with Bibliotek.dk, which is the end‐user web interface to the public union catalogue. A detailed description is given of the development of an end‐user ILL system.

This facility is currently being tested and implementation is scheduled for the end of 2006.

The paper will be of interest to all librarians who wish to empower end users in searching for and obtaining material in which they are interested.

With the development and growth of the Washington Library Network Computer System in recent years, it has emerged as an effective and efficient automated system to support acquisitions, cataloging and other technical processing functions in libraries of all types and sizes. The online union catalog and COM catalog production has greatly expanded the effectiveness of reference and interlibrary loan services. This article covers all features of the computer system. It outlines system hardware, software, and the file structure as well as providing a description of the use of the system. Also discussed are system features such as authority and bibliographic quality control, precision database searching, and automated fund accounting for acquisitions and fiscal management. Other areas covered in this paper are: governance, administration, training, research and development, and types of users, both online and those which want to transfer software as in the recent successful installation of WLN software at the National Library of Australia.

Reports on a comparison of the 1992 Lambda Book Award titles and a sample of titles reviewed in the Lambda Book Report with a control group of titles listed in Publishers Weekly, “Forecasts”. Finds that while the Lambda Award titles received about the same number of reviews as the control group titles, the LBR sample received significantly fewer reviews. However, both samples of gay/lesbian/ bisexual books are held in significantly fewer OCLC libraries than are the control titles. Examines the content of reviews of sample books and finds that they show no apparent bias on the part of the reviewers.

Presents a report from the conference Preserving America’s Printed Resources: The Roles of Repositories, Depositories, and Collections of Record, organized by the Center for Research Libraries. This was a two‐part event held in Chicago, 21‐22 July 2003, and this report summarizes the second part, which was an extended discussion on the theme of repositories and collections of record, asking “How can libraries work together to optimize management of the nation’s knowledge resources in printed form?” The intended outcome of the discussion was to be an agenda consisting of realistic near‐ and long‐term national‐level actions, and identifying the appropriate participants in those activities and the roles those participants might play.

In writing about reference books it is difficult to recommend one rather than another unless one knows the exact purpose for which it is needed. This article, therefore, is a survey of the contents and scope of some important catalogues, union lists, and bibliographies of periodicals, and does not attempt to say that one is better or more useful than another. Each librarian can only decide that for himself.

This paper aims to study streamlined request services based on discrete systems’ integration in an academic library. The integration of discrete systems allows patrons to use the library’s online public access catalog to send requests and have the requests automatically transferred to the local integrated library system (ILS), the consortia borrowing system, and an interlibrary loan system. The integration of discrete systems also allows adding the consortia service without adding any library staff.

The authors introduce library holdings behind the search interface, the discrete library systems and the authentication system. The paper illustrates how patron requests can be automatically transferred to discrete library systems.

Resource sharing has become a hot topic in the library world where libraries are facing budget cuts, space limits and employee shortage challenges. Systems’ integration will help libraries to add new services without adding staff.

The consortia borrowing system can be seamlessly integrated into discrete library systems and a campus authentication system. Pepperdine University’s experience can serve as an example for libraries which have a plan to implement consortia borrowing systems or want to streamline their workflows.

This paper takes a fresh look at the traditional request services using cloud-based systems.

Since 1992, when OhioLINK’s central catalog was first implemented, the consortium’s union listing and serials holdings activities have shifted from an emphasis on print holdings in individual libraries for traditional inter‐library lending to dealing with holdings for electronic serials purchased with group licenses and with related issues for linking catalog records, abstracting and indexing data. Current work centers on using one record or separate records for multiple versions of a serial (especially print and electronic), the most comprehensible display for resources owned by the consortium as a group instead of by separate libraries, information about and display of holdings information for the electronic version of serials, and consistent metadata.